Dan

boo!

Music

I rented this from Gamefly and received it yesterday.

Not bad... Forza sim style with deducting points for different things and giving points for doing good things... 3rd person camera too close for my taste.

Need to put some more time into it, but the graphics did jump out... at least the taillights so far.

Time of day seems too fast, and I didn't see a way for a custom button setup...

chuckd21

Finally got to play this last night. I still don't think online was functioning as intended as a lot of the social hooks weren't loading up for me.

The game itself is... fine. Looks good and the driving is okay, but the constant penalties for doing anything wrong is annoying as sin, and the AI is laughable how it sticks to the driving line no matter what. And if you get in their way, you get penalized.

A little better than Forza 5, nowhere near as good as Forza Horizon 2. Jury still out on The Crew.

Adam Tyner

That sums up most of my thoughts. My wife is a racing game fanatic, and I bought DriveClub as a gift for her. She can't stand it, and although I've sunk less time into it, I'm right there with her. She's really into Forza 5, but she started after the currency/DLC had been overhauled, so she missed all the nasty stuff.

Gooter

So should I stay away from this if I'm not good at racers? It would frustrate me too much? But it is oh so pretty. Was going to get DC or Rivals.

chuckd21

Points are deducted for going off road, clipping corners, coming into contact with other cars, etc. It doesn't affect your final time, only the points you earn for leveling up and such. You can do all those things and still win races. You just won't hit all the secondary goals the game tasks you with.

Decker

They're so different. This is so pretty but punitive. Rivals is very fun, but a very different sort of game and doesn't look that great.
I don't think this game is punishingly hard, but the fact that you're docked (quite harshly) for your driving mistakes does suck.

It's weird how a game can get so many of the difficult things in game development so right (car graphics, interesting tracks, driving physics) and yet make certain gameplay choices like these point deductions (and the over-reliance on online races to advance your career) which really hamper gameplay and could have been easily rectified.

You can't make an ugly game look gorgeous late in development, but I'd imagine these frustrations could have been easily addressed.

Adam Tyner

Some penalties do slow you down a good bit, and that can affect the final time.

Gooter

Wish the PS Plus version wasn't borked. This screams try me first. Will have to check Redbox like Decker said.

Music

Yeah, I played it twice and sent it back to GameFly, I'll wait for the PS+ version to waste anymore time with it.

Jcheckel

I picked this up with the sale from Amazon, and I'm liking it even though I'm awful at it. It does seem to deduct quite a few points, but I still seem to be getting a lot as well. The weather stuff is so pretty, I just wish it was in the Tour part as well, maybe it will be in the future packs, it probably wasn't added to the old races because of leaderboards.

slop101

Did they go an improve this game compared to when it was first released?

These rain effects on the windshield look remarkable!

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/7-JCp2iSkbk" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

slop101

No one? Really?

Well, here's a "re-review" that takes into account all the improvements. Looks like I need to pick this up now, especially since amazon has it for $39.


<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/YuTK3FneaxI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

19K

I'll admit, the weather effects in those videos are truly stunning. That has to be the most impressive next-gen graphics/lighting/weather effects I've seen in any game on the market.

That being said, the graphics weren't really the issue when the game launched. The guy in that video spent 5 minutes talking about rain and lighting.

I love racing games, but the gameplay in this isn't grabbing my attention for some reason. Seems like pretty standard racing fare. I'm still waiting on the Plus version to try it before I buy. I hope they didn't lose their audience with a poor launch and it turns out to be really successful.

chuckd21

The weather in the game looks remarkable. However you can either look at the weather or you can concentrate on the race. When you do the latter, it doesn't much matter how pretty the individual droplets look. I was sucked in by the videos of weather effects too, but once you get into a race it's just another obstacle.

slop101

So the racing/driving itself is srota' dull?

Groucho

That ship has sailed...I think this thing is dead in the water unless they give away the whole core game as the freebie for the PSN outage.

musick

LOL .... not going to happen

Sony: here Mr. Customer is your free game that wouldn't work online when released for your troubles because we couldn't keep our services online over the holiday



there are still plenty of people that would like to play the stripped down Plus version when it is finally rolled out

mr.snowmizer

I see you came across the video that has inspired a large neogaf thread.

Having witten the game off, like most people, I don't know how the game played originally. But after all the praise for the game there once it popped back up in conversation (post=weather patch), combined with its then~$35 price, I decided to take a chance.

And...

I think it's surprisingly good. In fact, with its solo mode races lasting usually 90 seconds to 3:30 and nearly instant event restarts, this might be the most addictive 'just one more time' game I can remember personally playing in this genre.

RichC2

The game cracked 1m copies sold worldwide so it isn't a flop, they need to keep updating it. The US Version should drop in price soon though since the sales here have stalled.

slop101

So I ended up getting this and played it for a couple hours last night - I actually really like it! Maybe my expectations may have been tempered by all the lukewarm reviews, but I've found it to be more than a solid racer. Sure, it has no big frills, but it more than makes up for that with some of the best videogame graphics I've ever seen in my life so far.

The only real bummer is that the stuff behind the paywall are in the gameplay menus with everything else. I understanding having DLC and all, but they need to separate that shit from the rest of the game. Seeing that stuff, locked up, ready to charge your credit card if you click on it, right next to the regular game is pure asshole.

chess

Definitely a pet peeve.

Reminds me of NFS Most Wanted with cars sitting in the world that you couldn't drive unless you paid for them separately.

Game looks technically stunning and remains on my bargain bin list.

slop101

New track coming later this month, for free!

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/QcwK7hDCieQ" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

astrochimp

Did they just forget about the free version?

Decker

No. They just hope you did.